The directing debut by Ralph
Fiennes is
largely a misstep. In adapting to film this minor
Shakespeare tragedy from four hundred years ago,
Fiennes can never show why his unsympathetic rigid
patriotic Roman general protagonist was a great man or
why we should care about such a despicable tyrant's
fall from power. Fiennes also stars and is a
co-producer.
Writer John Logan transports Shakespeare to
modern-warfare times, and by using handheld cameras to
paint a faux-documentary style of a battlefield aims
to reach out to inculcate in modern times the Bard's
thinking in matters of class-warfare, duty to country, popular
uprisings, valor in battle, the corruption of power
and the parts played by civilian politicians and
military leaders in conducting war and carrying out
political policies. The cast speak Shakespearean
in iambic
pentameter, while the visuals reflect modern
skirmishes of tanks
in the street, CNN TV coverage and soldiers armed with
the latest in military hardware going into battle.
It's an odd stew, that never smells quite right. It's
also boring, humorless and grating in its hysterical
intensity.

The narrative focuses on
the powerful Roman
general Caius
Martius (Ralph Fiennes), who
conquers the
city of Corioles, a stronghold of his Rome's rival
country of Volscian,
and subjects its
working-class population to mistreatment. When they
riot for food because of their hunger, the General has
his overwhelming army crush the rioters.

The next victorious conflict for the General is
with the border state rival led by the brave Volscian
rebel leader Tullus
Aufidius (Gerard
Butler), who tries to retaliate. Though faced with
growing unrest by the populace at home, the apolitical
General is promoted to a consulship and takes the
titular name of Coriolanus. Thereby the mighty brave
warrior Martius vents his feelings of contempt for the
masses in his harsh arrogant actions and public rants,
even though counseled by his wise political friend
Menenius (Brian Cox), loyal wife Virgilia (Jessica
Chastain), and influential scheming mother Volumnia
(Vanessa Redgrave) not to go down that political road
with such a lack of guile. Mom is a reason given for
her son being so warped. This utter disdain for the
common people and being ill-suited to be a politician,
will bring about Martius's
downfall.

Banished by Rome for his
intransigence to the masses, Martius now allies with Tullus to fight Rome in
revenge. Branded a traitor and his forces defeated in
battle, Martius chooses suicide by the
hands of Tullus as a way of not suffering from further
humiliation.

The exhausting film's
ambitious aim was for us to see the raging battles
through the eyes of the contemporary media (the way we
now get the news) and note how we get a washed down
feed on the news. It also depicts that there is a
crisis of leadership in the world, and the bleak film
tells us it's a tragedy war and political foul-ups
never stop. But because it was so lackluster, it never
has as much an impact on film in telling about
America's recent failed wars in Iraq and Afghanistan
as maybe the creators thought when put to paper and
green-lighted for production.